News Article

Sandy Having An Effect On Shore Tourism

By Phil Gregory, WBGO News
Point Pleasant Beach. August 29, 2013

Governor Christie discusses the tourism season at news conference on Point Pleasant Beach boardwalk (photo by Phil Gregory)

With the Labor Day weekend upon us, Governor Christie says clean beaches and rebuilt boardwalks helped Jersey Shore towns have a good summer season.

Summer tourism revenue figures aren’t available yet, but the governor says anecdotal evidence indicates Sandy is having an effect.

Christie says businesses told him tourism is down more than 10 percent in Wildwood and is off off by 40 percent In Seaside Heights.

“A lot of this is very localized. If you’ve lost a lot of your rental stock people aren’t coming there for the week or two weeks or month that they used to. Those businesses in that particular town, the restaurants, the liquor stores, and the bars are not going to do as well because people tend to stay in the town where they rent.”

Christie says it will be a while before statistical data shows how successful the season has really been.

“We’re going to be getting information probably in mid September on sales tax numbers from town to town. That will help to tell us a bit, and when they’re the end of the summer suspect we’ll all be able to get some of this information from all the municipalities who keep track of things like beach badge sales and daily visitors and all the rest of that.”

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